


génération perdue

by Lauchme



Category: Hetalia: Axis Powers
Genre: 1910s, Alternate Universe - Historical, Class Issues, Gen, Historical References, Human AU, Period-Typical Homophobia, Period-Typical Racism, Period-Typical Sexism, World War I
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-10-20
Updated: 2019-06-12
Packaged: 2019-08-04 23:22:59
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 7,014
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16356266
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lauchme/pseuds/Lauchme
Summary: Matthew Williams has come of age in the wrong moment, on the eve of the war nobody yet could have known would mark the turning point in the capacity for human violence. Still, he seizes the opportunity to establish his adult independence to his adoptive father, not knowing yet what the cost would be.





	1. Terms of Engagement

**Author's Note:**

> This is my first APH fic, and something I've been thinking about for many years now- but only recently have I actually made headway with it. I wanted to create a vivid portrayal of Matthew, as a human and Canadian soldier in the war, but also of Canada as a nation and how the war shaped it. I want to make it as historically plausible as possible, and to bring in many elements of real events, people and places. If you notice something off history-wise, please shoot me a message or comment on it!

 

The day he’d told Mrs. Bennington of his intent to enlist as an officer, he’d thought his words through very carefully. Her lightly painted bottom lip curved from a sagging line to a tight upside-down bow momentarily, her grey eyes cast over by the shadows of her furrowed brows.

 

“I understand your decision, Matthew, and though I am proud- I worry you are not ready for such a thing.” Her wrinkles seemed deeper-set in the peculiar lighting of her parlour by candle-light. “You’re still a boy. I haven’t permitted you access to much of man’s world, I’m afraid, nor has my husband been able to facilitate your growth.” _Or Arthur,_ the silent addition was clear in Matthew’s mind. She did not speak much of him, in spite of his role in orchestrating his appointment in the Bennington house from the age of fourteen onwards. While their relationship was certainly cordial and by all means inseverable, Mrs. Bennington’s grudge against Arthur existed as a silent yet cumbersome shadow in the dark corners of those oversized rooms Matthew had grown up in.

 

He kept his face passive and yielding, removing his eyeglasses as a token of deference. His childhood fear of the lady of the manor had never quite worn off, though he now stood nearly a full foot above her. “Madam, I will be trained in whatever I lack before I go to the front. There’s no need to be concerned for me.”

 

Mrs. Bennington shook her head ever-slightly. “I’m afraid there are some things you will not learn at a training camp. But, nonetheless- I have the utmost faith in your will to succeed. You’ve always been a sharp boy.”

 

That much, by her definition of _sharp,_ was true. Matthew had a knack for picking up the new patterns impressed onto him, a necessity for the many changes of his skin he’d undergone in his eighteen years. It was something that his caretaker liked about him, that there was no resistance against whatever new form he was told to take- he filled any mold like water. He who was before a private school exemplar student would now become an exemplar officer, in an invisible metamorphosis of spirit.

 

* * *

 

He handed in his attestation form neatly filled with thin, wispy handwriting, the sort that his governess had always tutted about as immasculine. But, it was legible, and that was enough.

 

_1\. What is your Surname? — Williams_

_1a. What are your Christian Names? — Matthew Louis_

 

He had drifted, while filling out the details, in between the present and the nebulous shadowland that swallowed his early days, recalling things he hadn’t in very long recalled.

 

Perhaps his earliest memory was the woman he’d called _Mama._ She might not have been his blood mother; nobody had told him. When he asked about her, people cleared their throats and gestured in that stiff way that indicating it wasn’t a _civil_ subject to discuss. But it didn’t matter. She was the one who’d nursed him, whose dark eyes had been the first he remembered recognizing as _another,_ the person who had taught him personhood in her gentle smile as she guided his first steps propped against her bronze arms. She’d been the one to allow him to be born, and to survive.

 

* * *

 

_1b. What is your Present Address?: 68 Frederick Street, Toronto_

_2\. In what Town, Township or Parish, and in what Country were you born? — Ville de Québec, Canada_

 

He’d been around six or so when she died, some hazy amount of time after the man with golden hair had begun to come around to see him. Perhaps that was his father- he had asked him to call him _Pére,_ and so Matthew did. In that time, he’d still been called _Matthieu_ and been spoken to only in French, as well as the faded memory of some language he’d never known the name of that his mother had used. It was rare, but sometimes words he didn’t quite remember the meaning of still drifted through his mind.

 

The man’s name had been François, his father as far as he’d believed, and they’d lived by the river in that cold and ancient city for perhaps four years, until Matthieu became ten and another man, dressed in duller colours and with a less kind face, had begun to appear in the parlour late into the night and argue loudly with François. One day, he’d woken up and come for breakfast to find that without a goodbye, his father had left him, the stern yet apologetic face of the late-night intruder greeting him at the table in that harsh language Matthieu was them only slightly familiar with.

 

* * *

 

 

_3\. What is the name of your next-of-kin? — Arthur William Kirkland_

 

_4a. What is the relationship of your next-of-kin? — Guardian_

 

Arthur had told his new ward that François had left, and he’d be taking proper care of him from then on. Despite the way it hurt Matthieu to learn that the only family he’d known had abandoned him with a stranger, he found that Arthur was not a bad caretaker, as long as he was obedient and stopped speaking French in the house. They moved to a large estate inland, where everyone around him spoke English, and he became _Matthew._ He’d been happy there, learning from a handful of tutors alongside the other child Arthur had custody of. Matthew didn’t know if the boy was his biological child, but he found it doubtful considering his completely separate disposition, a loud and boisterous spirit that even the large property could barely contain. Though he was difficult to play with and worse yet to try and talk properly with, but Alfred quickly became his brother regardless of blood.

 

The marshes were thick, as were the forests on the lot. In autumn’s early mornings, Matthew had often gone out to sit amongst the foliage in the opaque fog and let it consume him, for a moment knowing the peace of having truly disappeared. It wouldn’t matter if he did, he figured. As long as he’d lived he had been passed hand to hand, and didn’t garner much attention himself as much as being carried along like debris in a river. Eventually he could sink beneath the surface and find stillness. Sometimes he heard a distant melody form from the wind and birdsong that illuminated ever-momentarily the evening songs his mother had sung for him, before those memories sank back into the dark and muddy water.

 

Before long Arthur had to return to England on business, and he was by fourteen made the ward of Mr.and Mrs. Charles Eugene Bennington, British citizens who lived in an elegant but sterile house in the city of Toronto. Mr. Bennington himself was most often in India conducting his government duties, while Mrs. Bennington did not directly interact with Matthew much aside from at dinner. The housekeeping staff was kind towards Matthew, and even his strict schoolmasters at the nearby academy became fond of him for his quiet and studious nature. There were no other children at the manor; Mrs. Bennington was barren, Matthew had heard from the perhaps dangerously talkative chambermaid Mary. It was a sore subject, and perhaps part of the reason that she was so stiff around Matthew, the child that was never really hers to keep so much as a loan. Nonetheless she showed affection the way she knew how to, with fine clothes and a collection of books for Matthew to keep in his room. When Mr. Bennington was around he’d call Matthew into his reading room and give him a man-to-man talk about whatever he’d seen in Deejarling that might make for a piece of moral wisdom, and Matthew would offer his recent successes at school to receive a kind pat on the shoulder and a glass of watered-down palm wine. 

 

* * *

 

_5\. What is the date of your birth? — July 1st, 1896_

 

He kept in touch with Alfred as well as Arthur, and became the jury in their quarrels through telegram transmissions; and when Alfred had cut himself out of Arthur’s jurisdiction in the last year and gone off on his own, he’d become the tense thread through which Arthur and Alfred might know of each other’s whereabouts. At least, Arthur came to visit more often once Alfred ceased to be his forefront priority. That much Matthew felt some guilty gratefulness for.

 

Still, that sheltered life was difficult for him; his actions ever-performative for the society he’d been brought into, a community of the elite of Toronto as well as diplomats from the empire and beyond. He’d learned how to sink even deeper into the background than he had living alongside Arthur and Alfred, how to avoid confrontation and read the emotions of a room such that he’d not become embroiled in anyone’s personal affairs. Those tired him, and he really had no interest in yet again becoming a playing piece in anyone’s arguments as he had for whatever enigmatic relation resulted in his losing François. Trust, he found, was a luxury he couldn’t be afforded, besides that he had in himself.

 

* * *

 

_9\. Are you currently in the Active Militia? — No_

 

_11\. Do you understand the nature and terms of your engagement?— Yes_

 

His hands shook slightly as he wrote, as if carrying a deadly weapon. This was the first time his own fate was truly in his hands.


	2. The Farewell Fire

By the time that he’d made it far enough to confidently bid his farewells and leave the city, it had already become hot and arid enough for the verdant foliage of early summer to begin curling into itself, a dusty and tired filter of midsummer light suffocating the manor gardens. The lawn had begun to yellow despite the best efforts of the gardeners to wage war against the thirsty nature of the season, and to fight the way that all of the water they yielded ended up once again evaporating as morning dew, returning to the ebullient clouds just over the lake. The garden, Matthew decided, didn’t feel the need to keep up appearances and continue its performance of foliage and flowers on the whim of its keepers. Nature could not, for all the pruning and planning and gardening staff on Earth, be made to indefinitely obey Man. He wished that he could do the same in that moment, wilt back into the dry earth rather than having to stand crisp and tall in the afternoon heat with a carefully cultivated smile.

* * *

 

 

Of course, it was no surprise that he was going to war; who wasn’t? He’d finished school and had no essential work to do at home, so naturally his duty was to defend the country so long as he was able- and he’d just turned eighteen that month, by some stroke of what might be perceived as destiny’s scheming. Still, it seemed to shock everyone he told that _he_ was going to be a part of it.

_Things weren’t going to be comfortable there,_ they told him, looking at him that disgusting pity- the memory of it made him angry, though that wasn’t an emotion his face would ever betray. Of course, he knew that, it’s a fucking _war,_ for Christ’s sake. He didn’t need the way they looked at him, as if he were something fragile and precious now doomed to be tainted and made unmarketable by the harsh reality of life off the shelf. But Matthew was not a child, he was a man- by the definitions set by the law, in any case. He became a man out of necessity, for king and country, not from the growth of years or even experience but by a sort of stretching of the soul to fit the form demanded of it.

 

He had been directed by the recruiters as to how to submit himself to officer training at Valcartier, feeling the unfamiliar gaze of not only one but many men silently sizing him up and questioning whether his boyish face could truly command respect from inferiors. He had the correct moral fibre, they told him, his class and education outstanding from his language and manner of carrying himself. But he was young, inexperienced. He’d have much to learn if he were to succeed, and, of course, survive.

 

A flurry of activity had filled his life from that moment on, with forms to fill, pamphlets to read and uniform fittings to attend. At last he had purpose, his direction determined. A telegram came from India expressing pride at his decision to fight for king and empire. Another from London expressed doubt about his ability to handle war, only further steeling Matthew’s belief that he had made the right choice. Perhaps after all this, he could at last obtain true respect from his sometimes-father.

 

* * *

 

 

His uniform dared to taunt him with its excess fabric, oversized sleeves, just so slight as to go unnoticed unless you were the wearer. But Matthew felt very small in that coat, regardless of how many aging women in minks commended him on his handsomeness through glassy eyes and wrinkling, somber faces they wouldn’t dare show his mother, had she been alive to see this day. It’s one thing to look at a person in such a way that reveals your expectation that they will soon die; very much another to plant such an idea in the minds of those who love them. It would take someone very cruel and certainly uncivil to do _that_.

 

He carefully and graciously accepted a cucumber sandwich from Mrs. Deare in silence and washed it down with a sip of his tea- it was intensely bitter from steeping for too long, but he said nothing of it.

 

Toronto had been unseasonably dry in particular on that day, when Mrs. Bennington had called around to gather her dearest friends to see Matthew off to his training camp. Cut glass vases were dusted and filled with roses, and porcelain teaware seldom used awakened. She had made an occasion out of it, perhaps for her own sake as much as Matthew’s; he figured that for a woman such as herself, who adores ceremony and revels in tradition, she might be compensating for the wedding that would never take place. 

 

The thought cut though the placid, rolling fog that insulated and guarded Matthew’s uncomfortable awareness, his astuteness for the true figure in a room of mirrors. He had long ago learned how to draw those fogs from their ancestral waters, so that he might not reveal the thing that everyone in the room is too afraid to think _much less say,_ or so that he might find enough dullness in his life to close his eyes and find sleep within a reasonable amount of time. It was a learned tactic, one that kept him quiet and composed, since there had never been another option. It was a survival skill in this world he’d soon be leaving. But something stronger than that trained will had cut through the haze long enough for a pinpoint of light to shine directly onto a fear that hadn’t stirred yet, somehow, in all this chaos of preparation. It came alive, its eyes opening wide as Matthew’s very own.

 

He could _die there._

 

Yes, he had known that and never stopped knowing it, on the superficial level, but now his soul knew it as well, and it wept like the scared little boy Matthew could no longer afford to be.

 

“Is the tea alright, Matthew?” Mrs. Bennington pulled his soul back into his body with a beacon of reality. Matthew had no choice but to reanimate, to smile and answer.

 

“Yes, thank you.” He knew that she’d been looking to probe him for cracks, and try to help him through his weakness so that he may move forward with fanfare and enthusiasm, but he didn’t want to offer that vulnerable child to her again. It wasn’t her fault, like a cat that had left its own mother too early and had no idea how to nurse her own- she simply didn’t know what to do when offered something pathetic and helpless like that, but watch and wait until it became strong enough to decide.

 

After all the guests had left him with lipstick marks on his cheeks, he helped the maids gather the leftover biscuits and sandwiches, leaving the parlour no more alive than the party had found it. Once again it became a still-life room, without any markers of having been used, the way that the Benningtons liked it to remain. Perhaps the room was meant to only exist as a stage set in the context of a celebration or great tragedy, never to be relegated to the dullness of everyday life, imbuing it with a sense of everlasting glory. As he exited, he hoped that he would never have to step into that casket again.


	3. The Journey to Valcartier

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Finally I get an excuse to search up things about the Toronto of old! It's interesting to know I pass by what used to be the immigrant's quarter of the city every day.

Mrs. Bennington saw Matthew to the train station and made him promise to give her the address to which to send care packages, and for letters sent home as often as possible. It was difficult not to get swept away by the river-like flow of khaki suits and their companions on the platform. Matthew hadn’t seen such a crowd in a very long time, not since the last Victoria Day celebration he’d attended in Ottawa as a child. It made him uneasy to be caught in the current of people he could barely relate to- young couples, women stuffing handkerchiefs as mementos into the jacket pockets of their departing men, parents doing their best to avoid tears and younger siblings clamouring for the attention of the new family hero. Comparatively, he and Mrs. Bennington made a stiff and awkward pair, as her face sagged with exhaustion from being caught up in the commonness of it all.

 

Her large hat concealed most of her face if she only turned slightly. Nonetheless the short and serious glances she gave from her steel-coloured eyes gave Matthew the same sense of trepidation as they had in his childhood. She took his hands into her own, and in that moment Matthew realized just how old she was getting, her veins protruding from under gauzey skin and the beginnings of the tremors of age in her touch. He’d never given it much thought before, but it would sadden him when she died.

 

“I know this must sound awfully trite considering your destination,” she began, her voice chalky and reserved. “But do take care, Matthew. I’ve never been so close to war, but Charles has, and if he were here he’d tell you of the horrors caused by complacency and misplaced moments of bravery.”

 

Matthew nodded. “Of course, Madam. I’ll do my best to be careful.”

 

“Remember that you are an officer. It’s not your place to throw yourself into the line of fire.” Her sunhat cast a netted shade over her face, holes of light boring into her skin. “I worry your kind heart might lead you to overextend yourself, Matthew.” 

 

Gloved hands shifted uncomfortably in felten pockets. “What do you mean?”

 

Mrs. Bennington once again looked at him in the eyes sharply, a commanding seriousness about her that seemed to deaden the noise of the crowded platform. “Leave the acts of reckless heroics to the common man. You’re of much more use giving orders than engaging in their brutishness, with your class and education. Don’t forget your place in the fraternity of war.”

 

The words were leaden in Matthew’s ears- was she implying he should hide behind his men? He knew that the Benningtons had some ideas about class that came across as harsh to him, but that she’d suggest so straightforwardly that his life was worth more than that of the common soldier filled him with an unbearable discomfort.

 

He waved from the window and watched as her slight frame disappeared as a charred phantom on a shrinking platform, disappearing within minutes into nothing but iron bars and railroad weeds swaying in the wake of his vessel.

 

Throughout the first few hours of the journey he maintained astute silence, watching the countryside monotony through the window in silent meditation. He wouldn’t have minded continuing on, but the man who he’d been seated with in his compartment seemed to have lost the end of his patience for self-contemplation.

 

“When do you suppose they’ll give us some food, then?” The raven-haired man had the accent and dress of any well-to-do family’s son Matthew had met, but he lounged in his seat without much regard for etiquette. Matthew supposed that polite conversation would be necessary.

 

“When it begins to get dark, I figure they’ll bring out some dinner,” he replied, feeling that his language was relaxing in this man’s company compared to hours ago with Mrs. Bennington. Perhaps it was simply that he’d been waiting for an opportunity to drop his guard, or perhaps it was that it felt wrong to use stilted and formal language with someone who splayed themselves on their banquette like a reclining cat. “It’s still a while to go.”

 

The man frowned, rolling up and looking out the window. “I noticed that you were staring outside for quite a while. I can’t imagine how it doesn’t drive you mad- it’s all just the same, rocks and trees for hours on end. I think it’s dreadful.”

 

Matthew scoffed. “I find it nice to get some peace of mind. What were _you_ doing, then?”

 

His compartment companion grinned mischievously. “Finally taking advantage of my privacy to do some reading.” He pulled a small pile of books out of his leather bag almost conspiratorially, silently offering Matthew a peek.

 

Gingerly, Matthew gave in to curiosity. By the way he spoke of them, Matthew would have expected some sort of perverse materials or images, but the reality was much duller; some novels, and a large tome entitled ‘On The Origin of Species'. He remembered something of hearing about this book, though he’d never read it himself- Mr. Bennington had bemoaned the ‘preposterous’ ideas therein over one formal dinner after a few too many libations. Still, Matthew was curious. “What’s it about?”

 

“Natural philosophy. A theory to explain the origins of man, and all other living things. It’s rather dense, but very logical and concise; I find myself agreeing with the conclusions so far. Of course, my father would disown me if I dared contradict his precious Biblical origin stories.”

 

The contempt laced in the man’s voice made Matthew even more anxious to fathom what sort of a person he was. “You… don’t believe in the Bible, then?”

 

Shaking his head, well-styled dark tresses well loose and unruly across his pale forehead, seeming like blots of stray ink knocked onto paper. “Not particularly, no. I’ve grown rather sick of God, actually. I hope you won’t hold it against me.”

 

Matthew had never met someone who so straightforwardly refused religion. Nearly everyone he’d met had been Christian, and The Benningtons had made sure to maintain his faith as well as its superiority over those of the foreigner. Mr. Bennington had told Matthew many a personal parable about the strange and barbaric acts in honour of some multitude of deities at his station in Deejarling, and the hedonism and ignorance of those poor wretches he oversaw. The one time Matthew had met others for himself was when he was fifteen and had managed to accidentally escape for an afternoon’s walk into what Mrs. Bennington venomously had called the Ward, where the other face of his city was made visible. In the demure enclave of polite society he remained caged in for most days, he’d never meet one more foreign than perhaps a German at most- but on that one walk he’d seen a Jewish baker, a Chinese grocer, and a bookshop wherein he couldn’t recognize a word printed. People living lives only a few streets from him, yet so entirely separate that it felt as if he’d stepped through a mirror into the opposite face of the Toronto he knew. It was louder, dirtier, but evenso far more alive than any stroll through the well-hedged neighbourhoods filled with associates of the Bennington house did. He wished that he hadn’t worn his best wool coat, that day, that for a moment he could pretend that he belonged in that small patch of otherness long enough to buy a strange fruit from the grocer or speak with the men drinking tea on a table made of apple crates beside their tenement. That was the closest that Matthew had ever gotten to a sense of what he’d only read of in his childhood tales of Adventure in the Empire- to be lost in a strange and foreign land, where you in fact are the only foreign thing.

 

“I won’t,” Matthew replied flatly, still lost in the smoke-scented fog of that distant memory. “What changed your mind, though? Your father- I assume you weren’t raised like this.”

 

The slight hint of a smile on his companion’s face turned to a wisp of a frown. “My father- all of my family, really- they’re very strict about religion, about the worst parts of it the most. The unquestioning obedience, the perennial fear and absolute hatred of all sin. I don’t seem particularly sinful to _you_ , do I?”

 

It came across as a loaded question to Matthew. He _knew_ from his Sunday school that yes, these minor sins like lounging about, speaking the Lord’s name in vain, and reading whatever could possibly be so shocking in that book of his, were held in the same regard as any great one. But he struggled to believe that any loving and all-embracing higher power would truly hold it against His children. Now he wondered if he was the naïve one, and how many deathly errors were attached to his own life- not discounting, most of all, that he’d been told in his life that both Catholicism and Protestantism were the only correct choice in God’s eyes, leaving him forever doubtful of the veracity of his faith. 

 

“No, you don’t.” Not anymore than his self, anyhow. Matthew didn’t feel like looking too deeply into his own record at the moment; to see something in himself that caused the rejection of the one Father he’d held faith never would. “Why do you ask?”

 

“Just curious.” He sat up, leaned in closer to Matthew, as if he were about to share a dangerous secret. “I realize I never introduced myself- Percival Knox. I go by Percy, naturally.”

 

Finally he had something to call this strange man who’d managed to entice him into wanting to hear every next outrageous thing that sprung from his mouth. “My name is Matthew Williams. I’m a ward of the Bennington family, despite my surname.”

 

“That would explain why I’ve never met you!” Percy’s eyebrows lifted. “The Bennington family is one my father consciously rejects acquaintance with- by his standards, yours is a house of sinful excess.”

 

“What, really?” Matthew scoffed. “And what sort of pious hermitage did _you_ live in, exactly?”

 

“Nothing to complain about, really- Not awful for Hamilton. Just rather dark and somber compared to other manors I’ve seen. More rules and regulation, regardless of if you’re servant or son of the manor’s lord himself. Not many social gatherings, as you can imagine. Any party one could have held there would have felt like a wake, anyhow.”

 

Matthew chuckled, his flabbergasted curiosity fading into genuine interest towards this strange young man.

 

Even with Matthew’s general ineptitude with socializing amongst those his own age, he and Percy managed to fill the idle hours with their shared schemes of escaping the oppressive control of high society, and proving their mettle on the battlefield in the name of justice. 

 

“They say we’ll be home in time for Christmas,” Percy grinned. “I’m nearly sad we won’t have a longer time over on the continent. I’m hoping to be stationed somewhere interesting, like France. Who knows? I might escape into some small Ville and never return.”

 

Matthew turned his head slightly as he processed the bold statement. “How would you go about with money if you cut yourself off from the family like that? And you told me you’ve never studied French.”

 

Percy shrugged, glanced out the window at the rolling fields of wheat. “Just an idle dream, really. Something nice for me to think about.”

 

As their dinners were served and they made up their cots to sleep in for the night, Matthew realized that Percy was perhaps the first friend he’d ever made; not counting his somewhat-brother, anyhow. 

 

At one moment as they’d begun delving into their shared childhood experiences of isolation and otherliness from their families and peers, Percy had brushed his hand against Matthew’s, and Matthew had liked it more than he cared to admit. Now, staring upwards at the roof of the coach and listening to the rhythmic rattling of their travel, he dared to think about it deeper. A new idea, unfamiliar and uncomfortable, swooped through the foggy, seafoam-sheltered landscape of Matthew’s half-asleep mind and took roost. Matthew knew his childhood sanctuary of the grey, understanding solitude of his thoughts couldn’t have remained untouchable forever, but he still feared the inevitable moment what that particular unwelcome thought would reveal itself to him.

 

When he finally slept, he dreamt of a story from the fairytale book Arthur had given him once, the one with the story of the little, lonesome mermaid he couldn’t help by cry for.


	4. A Brief Reeducation

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Oh, what a long while it's been! It might take a great amount of time, but I do intend to keep this thing going.

“It had been pasture and rye fields not one week ago. They’ve been working hard to prepare for you boys,” the nurse said with a smile. She had a sweet, peculiar accent and soft, kind hands, entirely unlike the boney and parchment-white ones Matthew had known from Mrs. Bennington. She fussed over the recruits like they were her own children, tight curls of auburn hair bobbing as she trotted.

 

He’d been given some trouble over needing eyeglasses since twenty-twenty vision was a listed requirement, but he’d had his doctor write an attestant that it was really only needed for close, precise tasks; to overlook a battlefield or command the trench he needn’t be able to read a letter or set a pocket watch unaided. Besides, he was to be an officer, not infantry- his chances to have the spectacles lost or broken would be quite limited. Here he stood alongside a group of twenty young men all headed towards the same fate; to pass along the chain of command to their men from a place of moral and mental authority, to machinate the freedom of some distant motherland.

 

If Matthew was entirely honest with himself, he hadn’t given all too much thought to exactly _why_ they were going to war; his old governess would have been so cross, to see him go off rashly not even knowing why, though there ultimately was nothing to debate. One went to war for king and country; you do not _need_ to know why. Still, Matthew sat upon a hot coal of guilt, that he was behaving out of some impish need for rebellion he’d suppressed so as to better differentiate himself from Alfred through all their years together as Arthur’s somewhat-sons. He’d been quiet, demure, responsible, forgettable. Now was his opportunity to forge his own fate, to establish that he- yes, he- was just as much capable of free agency as Alfred ever was. By the time he’d done his job, Arthur would be proud, and not in the way he’d been proud in the past; not of a well-behaved boy, but of a man, an equal in lifetime’s experience.

 

Percy was chatting with the nurse, now, as she checked him for any signs of influenza— you couldn’t have anyone bringing Death into the forces before they’d even reached the war, after all. It was hard to believe that they were finally here, in this makeshift room of tarpaulin and repurposed lumber, preparing for the little training that they would receive before being taken across the ocean to a continent at once completely familiar and utterly alien. Matthew made a mental note to try and practice his French with the locals; he’d gotten embarrassingly rusty over the last decade’s ban on it in the household.

 

“I’ve passed, then?”

 

“Yes, Love; you look healthy, if not something pale and scrawny.” Loreen- that was her name, from what snippets of the conversation Matthew had picked up- had her hands on her hips, appraising the group with matronly sternness. “I do hope you all pick up a bit of colour and heft before you go off to the trenches. You boys look like you’d have a ghastly job of even transporting your weapons, let alone anything else.”

 

She wasn’t wrong; the officers-to-be were, for the most part, somewhat fragile-looking in their uniforms. In their former lives they likely hadn’t much need for physical labour, coming from the higher branches of society. They’d probably looked quite dashing in their gentleman’s wear, yet here they seemed anemic and out of their element. Matthew wondered if he looked the same, and how they were to command the respect of their men.

 

The doctor— a man with grey and white whiskers that could’ve encircled his head— came into the tent, thoroughly soaked. 

 

“That’s enough, Miss O’Grady. You aren’t here to berate our finest men, are you?”

 

“Oh, I’m just teasin’. They’re good lads, after all.” She smiled somewhat coquettishly and the doctor looked away quite forcedly.

 

“Ah- please bring me any notes you’ve made into my quarters after supper.” He coughed. “Anyhow- I’m just here to bring a bit of pertinent information to our fine young boys, courtesy of the YMCA.”

 

The YMCA? That name rang familiar to Matthew. The doctor deposited a pile of pamphlets onto the desk in the centre of the room. The covers had vague illustrations, and a vaguer title; _The Way To Her House._

 

“Just a bit of wisdom on the prevention of venereal disease. Now, I know you’re upstanding, respectable men- but I’ve seen too many fall victim to some vice under the duress of wartime, and I’d like to do my bit to prevent such losses.”

 

A fellow with the dark shadow of the stubble the journey had left on him- he’d probably been clean-shaven and smooth as a toy tin soldier way back whenever he’d gotten aboard the train here- raised an eyebrow and smiled knowingly. As the attending staff turned away from them, he grinned brightly at his comrades. “Those sicknesses are nasty stuff, lads. ‘Ave you ever seen a fellow with syphilis? Eats your flesh an’ then your brain.”

 

While disturbed, Matthew and his fellows couldn’t help but lean a little closer to better hear Mr. Andrew Whittaker’s insipid tales of his father’s clinic in Halifax; how the sailors would come in cursing the name of whatever madam in a distant port they felt it apt to blame for their deteriorating conditions.

 

“They’re the ones who stepped into the ladies’ parlours, though,” Andrew muttered. “But a man scarcely likes t’ blame ‘imself for his misfortunes when he could blame a woman."

 

Andrew intended to become a doctor himself, after this whole affair, not least because he could stomach and in fact enjoyed the grisly work of examining and treating such afflictions. He spoke with an accent that fascinated Matthew, though he could see a few of his peers sneering under raised noses. He hardly spoke in the manner expected of a renowned doctor’s son, having picked up the dialect of the land he was raised in. It couldn’t be helped, though. Even here and now, amongst this throng of carefully selected leaders, a hierarchy was invisibly forming. 

 

The good doctor came around to examine that nobody had picked up anything on the long journey here that might spread around the camp and incapacitate a great deal of soldiers before the battlefield had even been reached; the damp, cold conditions were exactly the sort of thing that’d have Mrs. Bennington fussing about the potential of pneumonia striking him dead if he wasn’t careful. As the group was eventually herded into yet another tent, they received a paltry meal that he was assured was still far better than anything the private-recruits were getting. 

 

The sound of rain against tarpaulin made Matthew wonder what it’d sound like when they’d be under gunfire. As a little boy, he remembered being so easily frightened by the sound of raindrops hitting the tin roofing of that little shed where he’d sometimes play; how it had made Francis laugh when he’d come running home in terror, thinking that the sky was falling. Would it always be frightening, or would it grow to become a soothing rhythm like that of the rain?

 

He then realized, for the first time since arriving here, that he wasn’t so far at all from that city where he’d been born. Still, he heard scarcely a word of French amongst the throngs of recruits here.

 

The smell of sawdust and damp fabric left Matthew with little appetite, but he didn’t want to get scolded for wasting the meal. He quietly ate his stew and, at the first opportunity, made a gracious exit.

 

Standing in the rainshadow of a leaning stand of lumber, he watched the camp seemingly grow by the moment, like an anthill. He’d been told by the recruitment officer that they were putting all they could into this camp— running water, electricity, telephone lines— he could call Alfred, maybe, let him know how things were going. Mrs. Bennington and Arthur alike still were peculiarly attached to the old telegram. 

 

Adjacent to him, a group of young, rough-hewn looking men in all manner of poorly-sized and inconsistent uniform were smoking and chatting idly, a dozen different accents on their tongues. Matthew listened rather than joined the conversations beside him, knowing full-well his uniform would give him away as a superior, and would likely demolish the sort of honest talk going on between the fellows. He had a lifetime’s experience of listening from afar, and even through the din of men and horses and rain he caught snippets of what had brought these men here.

 

“I’ve always wanted to have some real adventure in my life, not live and die in the same awful prairie town like my father did. Farming is a dreadful life, I tell you.”

 

“I wasn’t of age during the Boer War, and look how that mess turned out for the Empire— always did feel a sense of duty to the Motherland.”

 

“The wife’s such a pain, and I’m sick of hearin’ the children bicker; it’s a decent enough excuse, servin’ King an’ Country. And I imagine what I’ll do in Europe with the dames won’t make news back home…”

 

“It’s a job, and they give us food, booze and smokes on top of the pay. There’s no decent work around my town nowadays.”

 

“My girl Annie just loves the look of this ‘ere uniform, and I can’t have her thinking I’m a coward.”

 

“I just want to do what’s right.”

 

He sensed someone’s approach behind him, and turned to see a familiar face at last amongst the thousands of new faces.

 

“Percy, I thought I’d lost sight of you for good.”

 

Even with his mop of dark hair rain-soaked and his khakis wrinkled, Matthew couldn’t help but think that Percy looked like the sort of man they’d model onto those recruitment posters— handsome and poised, with some suggestion of daring intent in his eyes.

 

“You’re not quite so lucky yet,” came the sly response. He then produced from his jacket pocket a cigarette tin and small matchbox, placing one on his lips and extending the other to Matthew. “Care for one?”

 

Not wanting to look like a prim Mother’s Boy in front of his only friend here, Matthew accepted it, even though smoking had never appealed to him— he’d tried out Arthur’s pipe once, on a dare from Alfred, and nearly threw up. Still, perhaps this would be the new norm of his military life. 

 

Percy lit his and Matthew’s in one stroke, with a graze of the hand that did not go unnoticed, and Matthew tried not to cough. The two turned towards a scene unfolding before them, comfortably distant from it so as not to be part of it, but still able to observe. A querulous-looking but well-dressed man surrounded by a small attachment of some of the higher-ranking officers— as well as what looked to be the supervisors of the myriad construction efforts still ongoing— was giving instructions none too gently. The commander that Matthew recognized as having chosen him for an officer was there as well, a bit flustered to be taking orders himself by the looks of it.

 

“That’s Sir Sam Hughes,” Percy commented. “Our very own minister of militia and defense, probably here to complain the camp’s not expanding fast enough. Word has it he despises the command as it is, sneers at the old hats. I suppose we’ve got him to thank for all this chaos here.”

 

“I’ve heard of him,” Matthew replied. “My guardian loathes him for what he’s doing to the old order of things. Her husband, too.”

 

“Well, if he’s gone and ruined things, it’s us who’ll pay in blood,” Percy chuckled cheerlessly. “So let’s hope he’s good for something.”

 

In the distance, the sound of a train rumbled through the forests and fields surrounding Valcartier; those rails had been specially built to bring recruits here, like new blood vessels growing and twisting to form a new beating heart. And here they were, the blood of the land, prepared to spill over for the sake of that larger body, the Empire.

 

And within that Empire, he had always been but a speck of blood in its leftmost arm; an insignificant and remote thing, but nonetheless part of its vital force. Soon enough he would reach across to its right hand, he knew, to the Old World and the immediacy of the battle— and to Arthur.


End file.
